Australia Australia - Marion Barter, 51, missing after trip to UK, Jun 1997 #5

[SaintGertrude]

Are there places in Europe or Asia where it would have been easy to Marry (like a Las Vegas type place)?

I don’t know that the info on her passenger card was necessarily untrue. If she married (or believed she was married) to a man living in Luxembourg—then the on the card may be truthful. Seems like purposefully lying on the passenger card would introduce an unnecessary (possibly significant) legal risk that Marion would want to avoid.

Here are the requirements for the UK but I am unsure if these have changed since 1997.
You must bring originals of the following documents to your appointment:

• details of the final venue for your ceremony
• a valid passport or UK birth certificate (if you were born before 1 January 1983)
• proof of your home address
• proof of any name changes (for example, a copy of a deed poll) If your normal address is outside the UK, you’ll need to give details of a UK contact address. For example, this could be your partner, friend or family member’s address
  If you or your partner are from outside the UK
  You’ll also need to bring:
  
  • a passport sized photo for each of you (even if only one of you is from outside the UK)
  • proof of your current immigration status (for example, your visa)
  • a translation of any documents that are not in English

 

[SaintGertrude]

The rules for marriages in Luxembourg can be found here Standesamtlich heiraten

 

[Lord Peter Flimsy]

@JLZ - I married in England a couple of years after Marion's disappearance and I just don't believe the "fake wedding" theory. Government bureaucracy in the UK is pretty inflexible as anyone who has lived here, had children here or got married here will know. You simply couldn't rock up to the register office and give fake names, and get married. We needed all the sort of ID you'd expect to have to provide - driving licence, passport, something with address to prove where we lived.

So in order for Marion to have had a wedding in the UK just days after she'd arrived, she would have had to change her name again, get new documents issued in that name, convince a registrar that it was kosher, and also get them to turn a blind eye to the fact that she wasn't legally allowed to marry in the UK on a tourist visa, and hadn't been in the country long enough to get married? Not buying it at all, I'm afraid.

She said she was married on her return to Australia, but she also said a lot of other things we know are not true. She may have been "married" unofficially in some quasi-religious ceremony or considered herself married in a "we're committed" sense, who knows. Or was just trying to cover her tracks further by arriving in Aus as a married woman called Florabella rather than a single/divorced woman called Marion. Who knows.

The whole speculation about spies and espionage is just too far-fetched. This is 1997 we're talking about, the Berlin wall had fallen, the USSR had disintegrated. I also agree that many people with German surnames changed them in the first half of the 20th century, even the Royal Family adopted Windsor rather than Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

I’m not so sure EU nationals marrying in the UK would find it as difficult as it would seem at first. Fake marriage scams were 2 a penny in the UK mainly for immigration purposes. I would hazard a guess many took place close to transport hubs such as Heathrow.

The couple I highlighted that married on the 7 July 1997 near Heathrow using Mr Rs mothers maiden name never lived or were registered at the address shown on the marriage certificate putting paid to the idea you would have had to prove a UK address. Furthermore these names do not appear on any records in the UK at any point (e.g telephone directory, Electoral role etc)

 

[SaintGertrude]

I’m not so sure EU nationals marrying in the UK would find it as difficult as it would seem at first. Fake marriage scams were 2 a penny in the UK mainly for immigration purposes. I would hazard a guess many took place close to transport hubs such as Heathrow.

The couple I highlighted that married on the 7 July 1997 near Heathrow using Mr Rs mothers maiden name never lived or were registered at the address shown on the marriage certificate putting paid to the idea you would have had to prove a UK address. Furthermore these names do not appear on any records in the UK at any point (e.g telephone directory, Electoral role etc)

People do not always leave a trace as the electoral roll has an opt out for a name to be published on the electoral roll. I agree that most people were in the BT directory back then as it was not really the age of mobiles as it is today so landlines were plentiful.

 

[JLZ]

I hope ok to post as nothing to do with an individual who we are not allowed to discuss on here.

(With reference to Le courier advert mentioned in the lady vanishes podcast which may or may not have involved Marion). Has anyone looked up the name F Remakel in the United States White Pages.

I find it interesting that a Frances Mary Remakel passed away according to United States Social Security Death Index in Cook, Illinois in June 1994. However, looking on the family search site there is also a male Remakel with almost the same name (apart from the letter i in Francis) and year of birth in Cook, Illinois, also zip code the same as still alive the following year which I find rather puzzling. Possibly a different person and not that someone has not taken on the name of a deceased person.
**Le Courier advert was placed on Saturday 10th December 1994*

My reading is the person died and wasn't removed from the records of those living there immediately. There could be a number of reasons for that. I don't think it's a different person or someone taking her name after death.

 

[SaintGertrude]

My reading is the person died and wasn't removed from the records of those living there immediately. There could be a number of reasons for that. I don't think it's a different person or someone taking her name after death.

It could be but someone else has then listed Frances (female variation) Remakel as living in Illinois until 15 November 2007. It may just be a huge co-incidence with the name and year/Month of birth/town but I always thought Remakel was not such a common name. And of course the Le Courier advert was in 1994.

 

[JLZ]

It could be but someone else has then listed Frances (female variation) Remakel as living in Illinois until 15 November 2007. It may just be a huge co-incidence with the name and year/Month of birth/town but I always thought Remakel was not such a common name. And of course the Le Courier advert was in 1994.

That's a long time. Voter fraud?

 

[SaintGertrude]

Possibly voter fraud or the year of birth had been transcribed or even a coincidence . A romance fraudster like Markovic is also plausible especially if he was ever in USA as well as Australia between 1994 to 1997 and wanted to spin a few yarns with names.

 

[Itsapuzzle]

Have we ever heard from any of Marion's friends from the Arts Centre .... were they at the inquest? The answer to the mystery man in the car, at the very least, lies with them. Who were these people and why haven't we heard from them? The Byron Bay wedding was in April - that's when Greg E and Marion finally ended as a couple, so we've got April/May where she's met someone else .... has to be the Arts Centre crowd, hey ..... why has that drawn such a blank in the podcast and the reporting? Who are these people .... especially the friend of mutual friends at the Arts Centre.

 

[KiwiNZ]

x

 

[Itsapuzzle]

Have been thinking about the passenger cards ..... would it be possible for a fraudster to have in their possession an Incoming passenger card when departing Australia, back in 1997? That could explain how Marion's handwriting of the signature got on the returning form ... if travelling companion said they'd fill it out for her, then got her to sign - then "oh no, that's the wrong form - sign here", then produces the outgoing passenger card .... some kind of scenario like that, could that be possible? Was just looking at the numbers on the two passenger cards. Oh boy, looks like the only outgoing passenger card is the very poor quality mobile upload one; we need a better copy.

 

[Lord Peter Flimsy]

Have we ever heard from any of Marion's friends from the Arts Centre .... were they at the inquest? The answer to the mystery man in the car, at the very least, lies with them. Who were these people and why haven't we heard from them? The Byron Bay wedding was in April - that's when Greg E and Marion finally ended as a couple, so we've got April/May where she's met someone else .... has to be the Arts Centre crowd, hey ..... why has that drawn such a blank in the podcast and the reporting? Who are these people .... especially the friend of mutual friends at the Arts Centre.

A very good question. If Marion was a regular visitor I find it slightly strange no member of staff or acquaintance has come forward.

 

[Lord Peter Flimsy]

Have been thinking about the passenger cards ..... would it be possible for a fraudster to have in their possession an Incoming passenger card when departing Australia, back in 1997? That could explain how Marion's handwriting of the signature got on the returning form ... if travelling companion said they'd fill it out for her, then got her to sign - then "oh no, that's the wrong form - sign here", then produces the outgoing passenger card .... some kind of scenario like that, could that be possible? Was just looking at the numbers on the two passenger cards. Oh boy, looks like the only outgoing passenger card is the very poor quality mobile upload one; we need a better copy.

I too have pondered this. How easy was it to get a inbound passenger card (were they in serial number order). The handwriting may not matter if Marion had partially completed this whilst being manipulated by an unknown person.

 

[vivienbee]

Have we ever heard from any of Marion's friends from the Arts Centre .... were they at the inquest? The answer to the mystery man in the car, at the very least, lies with them. Who were these people and why haven't we heard from them? The Byron Bay wedding was in April - that's when Greg E and Marion finally ended as a couple, so we've got April/May where she's met someone else .... has to be the Arts Centre crowd, hey ..... why has that drawn such a blank in the podcast and the reporting? Who are these people .... especially the friend of mutual friends at the Arts Centre.

I'm not sure they necessarily do hold the answers. I think it's possible that Marion just said that he was someone from the Arts Centre to appease Sally and stop her from asking any more questions. Regardless, it would be good to hear from them.

 

[Meligator]

Homicide investigators must have Marions overseas travel/passenger records by now. I’m guessing that’s a logical early investigative step and probably info countries share with one another all the time for investigative purposes. The fact that her travel is not yet publicly known makes me wonder if there were unexpected destinations in her travel that are significant re the investigation. If she had simply flown AU to London, through S Korea-would that have been confirmed publicly by now?

 

[Itsapuzzle]

I too have pondered this. How easy was it to get a inbound passenger card (were they in serial number order). The handwriting may not matter if Marion had partially completed this whilst being manipulated by an unknown person.

Yes, that's what I've been wondering about, serial numbers for each specific flight? Was reading somewhere that you could pick them up at a few different places before flight, not sure if that was in 1997 - just putting up the pics of the numbers on the docs if anyone's interested.

 

[Itsapuzzle]

I'm not sure they necessarily do hold the answers. I think it's possible that Marion just said that he was someone from the Arts Centre to appease Sally and stop her from asking any more questions. Regardless, it would be good to hear from them.

Yep, agree Vivienbee, could be just a yarn spun by Marion for sure, but Sally's recall of what was said makes me think, h'mm, it's a little too specific - found the first mention of it in Episode 1 - Left Behind at 20.01 mins - when asked about who the man in the car was, Marion's response:
"Just a friend, I'd met him at the Art Centre through a friend of - mutual friend, and he just wanted to take me out for a drink before I go overseas"
It's also interesting that Sally says he had "darker coloured skin"

 

[sunnynz]

Was just listening to another podcast and they mentioned the Wayback Machine. I wondered if anyone's exhausted that as an avenue of investigation? I started poking around, not a lot of sites on there from 1997. It seems like 1998 was when it kicked in. I looked up the arts centre website, Australian singles/dating sites (couldn't really search around those though, kept getting server errors), Le courier, a few Luxembourg sites. If anyone can think of any ideas on what we could search for I'm happy to do some more digging!

 

[KiwiNZ]

Was just listening to another podcast and they mentioned the Wayback Machine. I wondered if anyone's exhausted that as an avenue of investigation? I started poking around, not a lot of sites on there from 1997. It seems like 1998 was when it kicked in. I looked up the arts centre website, Australian singles/dating sites (couldn't really search around those though, kept getting server errors), Le courier, a few Luxembourg sites. If anyone can think of any ideas on what we could search for I'm happy to do some more digging!

I have spent a heap of time on the wayback machine ... quite addictive ... but found nothing so far.

I did however use it to take a company to court, they changed their website claims when they got my court paperwork and I was able to prove what they were at the time I signed the contact lol... it was actually quite funny .. off topic sorry.

 

[sunnynz]

I have spent a heap of time on the wayback machine ... quite addictive ... but found nothing so far.

I did however use it to take a company to court, they changed their website claims when they got my court paperwork and I was able to prove what they were at the time I signed the contact lol... it was actually quite funny .. off topic sorry.

That is funny! Bet they didn't know they were up against a websleuth...